Almond Matters: Making Ag Day, Everyday

In today’s Almond Matters, brought to you by Valent USA Corporation, a movement called Ag Day 365 is looking to expand agriculture awareness to a daily mission rather than once a year.

American Agri-Women have started a campaign that aims to make agriculture awareness a daily activity. President Doris Mold spoke about the campaign at the World Ag Expo in February. “What it is is an advocacy campaign where we are reaching consumers about how ag day really is every day of the year,” she said.

Mold said the organization started with using its affiliates and partners to help spread the message but are now asking for all of agriculture to get involved. “We know it’s important. One day out of the year, National Ag Day, is not enough to really talk about the importance of agriculture. We want to keep it front and center in the minds of consumers as to how important it is,” she said.

American Agri-Women started this campaign in November at its annual convention. Mold said there it pledged to campaign for 365 days straight to kick-start the movement. “I am not from California, but I know that the almonds and the other products that are grown here really depend on water,” Mold said. “Some of my colleagues out here in California had to push out their orchards or shake the blossoms off to keep the tree going because of a lack of water. We need to make sure the consumer is aware of that so when they open that wonderful pack of smoked almonds they realize the hard work and threats to that product that took place. We need to provide that factual information in a way that they can understand.”

So how can you participate? The easiest way to do so is through social media. “#AgDay365 is the hashtag and as we grow we are going to build out more social media but using that hashtag now is the easiest way,” Mold said. “We are adding activities so it’s not just a social media-based campaign, it’s going to be a campaign where we are doing things locally, statewide, regionally and nationally.”

Mold said examples of future events could be educational opportunities at fairs, agriculture in the classroom projects and promotional giveaways.